


built with a heart (broken from the start)

by transgirluma (gayapplewhite)



Category: Descendants (Disney Movies)
Genre: Audrey Getting The Apology She Deserves Damnit, Gen, It's kinda Mal/Audrey if you squint, Italics, Lowercase, Mentions of Violence, The Isle Sucks and Fucks You Up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-14
Updated: 2017-08-14
Packaged: 2018-12-15 07:57:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,093
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11801769
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gayapplewhite/pseuds/transgirluma
Summary: “audrey spots mal leaning against the staircase. her face looks almost worried, which is an expression audrey's never seen on mal's face, before now. her hair is back to purple, though it's more lilac than an eggplant, but at least it isn't bleached blonde, twisted unnaturally into a color it wasn't meant to be. audrey had seen photos, and they'd been unsettling. mal trying to mold herself into something she wasn't. well. she's glad that got sorted out, even if it took going back to the isle to do it (she thinks. she's only heard whispered rumors of what happened the week of the royal cotillion).”or; when audrey returns, mal wants to talk.





	built with a heart (broken from the start)

**Author's Note:**

> yes, i know audrey left for some bullshit spa vacation reason in-canon. yes, i am ignoring it. this is the apology audrey deserves and mal better give her an apology in d3, damnit. this is for the fic day of #bringaudreybackford3 which is an event on tumblr, twitter and instagram. please participate i miss audrey we are begging you. 
> 
> the title comes from marina and the diamond's “valley of the dolls”. please kudos and comment if you enjoyed this fic, it means a lot to me!

audrey returns to auradon prep the following school year with four pastel-pink suitcases. ben and lonnie and jane and ruby are all waiting for her, and there's cheek kisses and hugs and “audrey, we missed you _so_ much,” over and over and over, and as glad as audrey is to be back for senior year, she doesn't like this part. the part where everyone remembers her as “audrey, who left for a year because her parents got all freaked out by a lizard”. she wants to be the audrey she was before she left. head cheerleader, princess, friend. she thinks that some girls on the squad value being bitches (which, frankly, is a word audrey's grandmother would blanch at her saying, but it's true and audrey may be some things, but she is not a liar), but audrey has always been a friend. to jane, her ever-neurotic fairy of a friend, and to lonnie, the daughter of ambassadors and first girl on the r.o.a.r. team, and to ben, the king (and her ex), and to ruby, the absent-minded artist princess. but once the hellos are squared away and doug and ben are carrying her bags up to her room audrey spots mal leaning against the staircase. her face looks almost worried, which is an expression audrey's never seen on mal's face, before now. her hair is back to purple, though it's more lilac than an eggplant, but at least it isn't bleached blonde, twisted unnaturally into a color it wasn't meant to be. audrey had seen photos, and they'd been unsettling. mal trying to mold herself into something she wasn't. well. she's glad that got sorted out, even if it took going back to the isle to do it (she thinks. she's only heard whispered rumors of what happened the week of the royal cotillion).

“hello,” audrey says, voice bright and cheerful and a little bit confused (more than a little bit, if she's being honest).

“hey, princess,” mal says. audrey cocks an eyebrow. apparently she's stolen jay's nickname for her. well. one of them. “can we talk?” mal asks, and audrey nods.

“sure,” she says, and mal glances around the lobby where lonnie and jane and ruby are all staring at them intently.

“somewhere else?” mal asks, a beat of annoyance in her voice. audrey nods, and mal grabs her wrist and leads her out into the gazebo. audrey blinks. huh. she hasn't been here since she was dating ben. which was almost a year ago, at this point. mal takes a seat and gestures for audrey to follow, and she does.

“audrey, look,” mal says, quietly. she won't meet audrey's eyes. this is worrisome, audrey thinks. she thinks back to what jay had told her about mal and the isle and eye contact. eye contact is the only way to ensure your opponent knows that they are going to lose. if you don't meet your opponent's eyes, you are weak. you are weak, and everyone knows it.

“what's this — ” audrey begins, and mal cuts her off.

mal takes a breath, visibly steeling herself and looks up, meets audrey's eyes. “audrey. i'm going to talk and i need you to not interrupt me becuse if i don't say this now, i won't say it at all and i really, really have to tell you this? okay?” audrey nods, and mal takes a long breath again, and then begins. “while you were gone, everything got to me and i went running, like a _coward_ back to the isle and a lot of things happened, a lot of things went wrong but it ended with ursula's daughter coming over from the isle, and she crashed the royal cotillion, and she'd love-spelled ben, i thought she'd stolen him, and it hurt, audrey, hurt more than i've been hurt in a long, _long_ time, audrey, and it was then i realized — i did the exact same thing to you. at the tourney game, remember? i spelled ben and took him away from you, and the only difference between us is you didn't get him _back_.” mal stops, looks down at her hands, and audrey doesn't know what to say. so she keeps quiet. there's a long pause, and then mal says, quietly, almost mournfully, “audrey, i'm so sorry.”

there's quiet for a long time after that. and then audrey reaches across the table and takes mal's hand in her own. “mal, i — i don't know what to say,” she says, and then, after a moment, she adds, “thank you. thank you for apologizing.”

mal sniffles, looking up at audrey with a teary smile on her face. “what?” she says, almost in shock.

“thank you for telling me you were sorry,” audrey repeats, and mal blinks.

“you're welcome,” she says. “that just wasn't what i was expecting. i expected you to tell me i deserved it.”

“maybe,” audrey admits. “maybe if it had happened right after the coronation. but i've — i've had a year, mal. i don't resent you anymore.”

“that's a surprise,” mal admits. “and hey, you telling me i deserved to hurt because uma spelled ben was what i deserved is nothing like what happened when you apologized to someone on the isle.”

audrey doesn't want to know, except she does. “what happened on the isle?” she asks, voice soft. when they'd first come, the vks talked about the isle like it was a point of pride, like it had made them strong. now the isle is hushed tones and pity and _thatreallywasn'tokayforyoutobehurtthatway_.

“well, on the isle, you only apologized if you'd endangered someone else. and if you'd hurt them, they could hurt you. beat you until they felt you'd earned it.”  
audrey doesn't blink. inside, she is horrified. how could her parents have let king beast subject someone to this? subject children, like her brothers. she has an image, then, of mal, of mal beaten bloody by older boys, jay standing to the side, powerless to stop it. if audrey knows anything about jay, she knows that she would have hated being powerless to save mal, even from her own mistakes. “that sounds awful,” audrey says, honestly, and mal nods.

“yeah, it uh — it wasn't the greatest, that's for sure.” audrey sqeeuzes mal's hand tight.

“hey, you're not on the isle anymore,” audrey says. “you're in auradon.”

“i know,” mal says, and she grins. “thanks, audrey.”

“don't mention it,” audrey says, grinning at mal, and together they get up, walking away from the gazebo and back to the school, still hand-in-hand.


End file.
